ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. For. Glob. Change
Sec. People and Forests
Volume 8 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/ffgc.2025.1692320
This article is part of the Research TopicBehavioral Psychology Applications In Managing Forest EcosystemsView all articles
The role of demographics in citizens' behavioral intentions for participatory forest management planning
Provisionally accepted
- Faculty of Forestry and Wood Sciences, Czech University of Life Sciences Prague (CZU), Prague, Czechia
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This study evaluated the influence of demographic variables on Czech citizens’ behavioral intentions (IN) to participate in forest management planning, by examining differences in the Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) model across demographic groups. Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) with multi-group analysis was applied to test how age, gender, education, income, occupation, area of residence, and forest ownership moderated the relationships among attitude (AT), subjective norms (SN), and perceived behavioral control (PBC). The results revealed that gender, education, area of residence, and income significantly moderated the influence of TPB constructs on participatory intention, while age, occupation, and forest ownership inquiry showed weaker or non-significant effects. Females exhibited stronger SN effects (β = 0.929), whereas males relied more heavily on PBC (β = 1.065). Higher-income respondents (>1,600 EUR /month) demonstrated a stronger PBC effect (β = 0.597), while lower-income participants were more influenced by SN (β = 0.933). Participants with a high school education or less were slightly more influenced by SN (β = 0.902) compared to college-educated respondents (β = 0.703). Additionally, suburban and rural residents were slightly more influenced by PBC (β = 0.671), whereas urban residents were more influenced by SN (β = 0.629). These findings highlight the importance of demographic and experiential diversity in shaping environmental behavior and provide actionable insights for developing inclusive and effective participatory forest management strategies.
Keywords: Behavioral Intention, Theory of planned behavior (TPB), Demographic variables, Participatory forest management planning, Czech Republic
Received: 26 Aug 2025; Accepted: 06 Oct 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Mohammadi, Kašpar and Tahri. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Zohreh Mohammadi, mohammadiz@fld.czu.cz
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